Disney Jumpstarts 'Hovercar' With Writer Dan Harris (Exclusive)

The project is an adaptation of Matthew Riley’s YA book "Hover Car Racer," which is set in a near future where humans travel in vehicles that float a few feet above the ground.

Disney is showing no signs of slowing down its development efforts in 2012.

Last week it put two directors on two projects, including the high-profile Maleficent with Angelina Jolie attached, and now the studio is revving up its sci-fi adventure movie Hovercar, bringing aboard Dan Harris to work on the script.

Hovercar is an adaptation of Matthew Riley’s YA book Hover Car Racer, which is set in a near future where humans travel in vehicles that float a few feet above the ground. In this society, racing the vehicles becomes a glamorous sport; and the book tells the story of Jason Chaser, a young man who enters an international race school.

Disney has been trying to find a way to bring the book to the screen since 2004, with writers such as David DiGilio, John Sayles and Blaise Hemingway taking cracks at the script.

Alfred Gough and Miles Millar (Smallville) are producing.

Harris, repped by CAA and Loeb and Loeb, is best known for writing, with Michael Dougherty, some of phe last decade’s biggest comic book movies, X2: X-Men United and Superman Returns.

Disney tapped Oscar-winning production designer Robert Stromberg to make his directorial debut with Maleficent and hired commerical director Brian Beletic on its untitled explorers adventure project.